Aurora Rising: The Complete Collection (151 page)

“What’s the price tag?”

She allowed one corner of her mouth to curl up a touch. “We’ll worry about that once our rogue general is taken care of.”

Vranas didn’t press her, presumably understanding the many variables at play in her statement. “Then if there is nothing else, I need to return to my office. Admiral. Marshal.”

After the door closed behind him Miriam turned back to Gianno. “I do have one final matter I want to mention. This needs to be between the two of us and off the record.”

“I have no recording devices installed in here, and the room is always shielded. What is it?”

Miriam wandered over to the window, curious as to what Vranas had been staring at. But there was nothing to see beyond rooftops and a shadowy tower painted against the darkness. Perhaps the answers he had sought were more ethereal in nature.

“I’ve learned some new details concerning the nature of the alien ships. They’re operated by shackled AIs, for lack of a better term: synthetic intelligences designed for a single purpose and provided the cognitive capabilities necessary to fulfill that purpose.”

“Useful intel, no doubt—but why the secrecy?”

“This intel need not be off the record. Use it as you see fit to refine your combat tactics.”

Gianno’s head titled. “And the Metigens themselves?”

“There are no organic beings inside the ships. We’re not actually fighting Metigens. We’re fighting their drones. The true aliens—I’m not sure I’d classify them as organic as such, but regardless—remain beyond the portal.”

“Ah.” A knowing smile tugged at Gianno’s lips. She said nothing, but there were only two people who would be able to impart this kind of knowledge, a fact they both appreciated. “And you have a notion about how we can use these facts to our advantage.”

“A ‘notion,’ as you put it, has been proposed, yes. Their ships are faster and stronger than ours, and on a computational level at least, smarter than us—smarter than our pilots, our ship captains and our battlefield commanders. Nevertheless, we do have machines which can match their speed of thought and sheer decisional power. Machines we dare not unleash, Eleni….” She paused sufficiently to ensure she had the woman’s attention. “Unless there is a way to harness their speed and power under human control.”

“I expect this will be interesting.”

“Quite. The proposal involves connecting a handful of people to carefully chosen Artificials and giving them some operational authority over combat decisions.”

Gianno frowned. “Via remote interfaces? That’s hardly revolutionary, nor is it a game-changer.”

“Clearly. I’m referring to a more integral connection, via a deeper neural interface.”

“No, the human brain can’t handle a direct link with an Artificial. It’s been tried multiple times to damaging and often lethal effect.”

I know. Believe me I know.
Thinking about the risks involved urged her toward panic, but she refused to give in to it.

“We—certain knowledgeable people—believe this obstacle may have been surmounted. I don’t want to say more right now, for two reasons: I won’t have a definitive answer to that question until tomorrow at the earliest, and I haven’t yet discussed this proposal with Prime Minister Brennon. But given how short our time is becoming, I wanted to give you the opportunity to begin assessing how something like this might work from your end, and who you might consider as potential candidates for participation.”

Gianno leaned against the wall behind her and templed her fingertips at her chin. “Well, Miriam, I would consider only one Artificial for the task: the one I control. Also, one candidate immediately springs to mind as perfect for such a reckless experiment—assuming she survives the battle at Elathan, that is.”

21

ELATHAN

S
ENECAN
F
EDERATION
C
OLONY

M
ORGAN DOVE IN A CORKSCREW SPIRAL
through an expanse of debris, dodging and spinning to avoid the remnants of some two thousand destroyed Federation warships and fighters and untold alien swarmers. And nine superdreadnoughts, of course. She and her comrades had done an impressive job of slicing through the enemy lines, weakening the attacking force to the point she’d daresay the Metigens would not take Elathan. Not today.

Yet in her gut she sensed they were losing. Not this engagement, but perhaps the war.

The debris she navigated through told the tale. Even with the far larger size of the superdreadnoughts, five meters of Federation wreckage existed for every meter of Metigen. The Federation forces present today represented more than a third of their
entire
forces. Elathan was important to be sure, and worth defending so strongly. Yet this success—every success she suspected—cost them far too much.

It was also a problem for those far higher ranking than she. Her purpose was to take out as many swarmers as possible. One at a time. Her kill count was nineteen so far.

She was still flying despite taking out such a high number for two primary reasons. One, the added variable of large-scale bedlam did make it somewhat easier to escape death, as there were many distractions and intervening factors. Two, Stanley had done an exceptional job of simming the swarmers’ flight patterns. Given the Artificial’s general weakness in tactical analysis, it was odd. But she could ruminate on the synthetic’s idiosyncrasies later.

A flash of red below provided her a target. The swarmer paid her no mind as it chased its own prey. All the better. She’d need to get in front of it in order to take it out, but all in due time.

This would be a great deal easier if her ship were equipped with an arcalaser. The prototype weapon had been such a delight to play with, especially once she determined the errors were occurring because the targeting ware was continuously recalculating not merely the path to the target, but the nature and location of the target itself. Once it initialized a ‘sticky’ end point goal, the admittedly mind-blowing dynamically-generated quantum waveguides nudged the laser to its destination at a 92% success rate.

At the end of four hours on the test field she had filed her report, set the engineers straight and begged Field Marshal Gianno to send her into the fight. She had reached and surpassed her fill of sims and tests and dummy targets. It was long past time for her to kill these monsters for real.

As they always did, the alien vessel swung 40° to the comparatively open side to aim at the broadside of its target, in this case another fighter.

Commander Lekkas:  SF-N3E-18B, do not alter course until I give the order, then dive -67° z.

SF-N3E-18B (Captain Prosky):  Uh, why—swarmer on my tail!

Commander Lekkas:  Do NOT alter course.

Captain Prosky:  Shit. Holding course.

She swung opposite the swarmer E 38°.

Target. Aim. Lock.

Commander Lekkas:  Now.

The fighter dropped, giving her a clear shot as the swarmer’s beam trailed after it.

Fire.

The enemy weapon jerked about for a single second before finding her and returning fire. But the delay was enough. Caught unprepared and on the defensive, it exploded while she still had a whole 12% left in her shields. She maneuvered around the resulting debris and made herself scarce until her shields recharged.

Captain Prosky:  Thanks.

Commander Lekkas:  What?
She had already moved on from the previous encounter and the imperiled fighter which had enabled it.
Oh. Sure. Watch your tail more closely from now on.

Captain Prosky:  Yes, Commander.

The sun’s rays caught the trio of wafer-thin rings circling Elathan as she arced above the bulk of the combat and traversed their plane, transforming the cornsilk-hued rings to a pure, vibrant gold. Annoyed at the interference in her view of the battlefield, she pivoted to put the luminous glow behind her.

Her new vantage revealed two cruisers playing a game of chicken with a superdreadnought. The alien behemoth was coming apart at the seams, crimson plasma streaming out of multiple hull breaches to leave an ominous cloud in its wake, but at this point its inertial force alone might send it crashing into both the cruisers if they didn’t divert soon.

She shook her head and berated herself for getting distracted; she was lucky a swarmer didn’t dart behind her and blow her engine while she gawked. Time for a new target. She studied the tactical whisper display, for she had found it a more reliable gauge in the crowded battlefield than simply looking out the viewport.

There. She climbed vertically to approach the target from above—

Colonel Idoni (SFS Gandin):  Commander Lekkas, return to the
Gandin
.

She jerked in surprise and lost track of the swarmer in the sea of enemy vessels. Retreat to the carrier? But the battle was far from over.

Commander Lekkas:  Repeat instruction.

Colonel Idoni:  Commander, you are ordered to return to the
Gandin
immediately.

What?

Commander Lekkas:  Acknowledged.

She wrenched the ship away from the center of the heaviest combat and toward the carrier hovering in relative safety six megameters away.

Morgan abandoned her fighter to the flight deck crew and stormed to the lift, where she marched in a tight circle all the way up to the bridge. The order had come from the
Gandin’s
XO, thus he was likeliest to know what the hell was going on.

An odd calm permeated the bridge. It probably shouldn’t be surprising, though. After delivering its fighters and assorted specialty craft, the carrier had little to do for the duration of the conflict other than catch the occasional damaged vessel limping into its bay and try not to get blown up.

She located the XO at a station to the left of the overlook and charged up to him, then tapped her foot impatiently and loudly while he issued instructions to a comms officer. He started turning away from her location, head buried in a handheld screen; she spun around him until she blocked his path. “Sir, I’m back aboard the
Gandin
and requesting an explanation as to why.”

“Ah, Commander. I was just about to send for you. You’re on a transport shuttle out of here for Seneca in eight minutes.”

“Is there a particular reason
why
?”

He shrugged. “Field Marshal’s orders.”

22

EARTH

EASC
H
EADQUARTERS

A
BARRAGE OF SPECIAL PROCEDURES
, subterfuge and security dominated their arrival on Earth. It all grated on Alex’s nerves like a shrill, discordant hum in her eardrums. She wanted to land at ORSC and dock in her own bay. She wanted to go home and take a shower in her loft and sleep in her own bed. She wanted to give the proverbial finger to the guards and escape their claustrophobic scrutiny.

Though the compulsion was strong, she did none of these things. She attributed her uncharacteristic restraint primarily to Caleb’s calming presence at her side, but also to a wholly unfamiliar desire to not aggravate her mother. Oh, she fully expected to aggravate her mother once or twice at a minimum before the fate of humanity was decided, but she would try to save it for something more worthwhile than well-meaning if irksome efforts to keep her alive.

She docked at EASC Headquarters under a false serial number designation and a false name. They were met at the hangar by Richard, a Major Lange and four imposing and formidable-looking military security officers. Given the audience, she received only a nod and a quick smile from Richard. He carried the rank of Brigadier now, after all, and was doubtless feeling the weight of his added authority.

Caleb made certain they had been cleared to carry their personal weapons, then they were taken directly to the relocated Operations offices. Their route did not take them by the Headquarters wreckage, but it was impossible to miss the deep rumble of heavy machinery permeating the air.

The layout and rooms of the Logistics building weren’t familiar to her. For as much as she had despised her visits to HQ, it had at least been a known quantity. This new location did little to put her at ease.

She griped quietly as they were led down another new hallway. “Ugh, I can’t believe I almost miss the Headquarters building.”

Caleb regarded her with a teasing twinkle in his eye, and she crinkled her nose up at him. “What?”

He leaned in closer so as not to be overheard by their escorts. “I was simply remembering…you strolled through that building like you owned the entire damn place, and not an officer’s stripe to be found on your person. You were amazing.”

“Right up until I got you arrested.”

His lips were at her ear. “Well, it worked out.”